Survival-Hunting for food

There is no concept of saving or planning for the Papua New Guineans. Mode of life is survival here in Kikori. Some of them don't even know what they will be eating that day. The coastal area (Kikori) are more hunter gatherers. I am told in the mountains, they plant and have gardens so most of the fruits and vegetables comes from the highlands. When they have found more than they can eat, they bring it to the market sometimes to sell it. The money they make, they can buy other items at the market or go to the store. There is a dismal store in Kikori. I will post a picture of the store some other time.


Above is a picture of a boy with a bow and arrow looking for food.


Above is a boy fishing from the bridge. He caught some shrimps.


Above is the whole family looking for food. The father is carrying a machete to cut whatever he finds. While driving on the road when I go to the oil company, I see people on the roads with their machete, bow and arrow, spears--looking for food. So you can imagine you hardly see any obese people here in PNG--only in the city and the politicians (^_^)


Above is a lady making sago which I've mentioned before is their main staple which is from the palm tree. It's a starch and it's from the trunk of the palm tree. The lady have to sieve the sago with water over and over and it just sounds like a very labour intensive process. Alternatively you can buy it from the market if you have the money


Above is sago being sold at the market. They use this sago to make sago pancake, sago roll, sago with coconut...etc..


Above is Esther (one of the PNG family I have gotten to know) digging for a bushhen egg. Basically in the jungle, if you see a mound of dirt/branches..., the bushhen lay their eggs in there. There maybe no eggs but there may be up to 5-6 eggs. It's basically the size of one bushhen egg is equivalent to 2-3 chicken eggs. So you dig and dig and dig. This time Esther and the gang found about 3 eggs. Most of them were right in the middle of the mound. If it was up to me, I wouldn't bother with the bushhen eggs. Too labour intensive. But I guess one egg is still food and better than no food. The PNG don't have concept of time as they have all the time in the world as most of them don't work so life is looking for food, hanging out with family..etc.. As there is no electricity, you sleep when the sun set and get up when the sun rise. Incredible that people still like this huh.


The hospital cooking area for the patients. There are no electric cooker or anything sophisticated like that. It's BBQ everyday. They have to hunt for wood to use for cooking. Some of them don't even have pots or pans, so they use hollowed bamboo or leaves to cook their food.


Above is a on the hospital corridors where patients store the wood and bamboo they have gathered.